Hopes and Fears (Mini-Sequel to Pocket Rocket)
by cranesandcranesandcranes
Summary: Oneshot, mini-sequel to Pocket Rocket: It's New Years Eve, and a year on from the ordeal that brought them together; AJ, Wade and friends have peace at last. However, behind this veneer, each continues to carry crippling doubts, lingering bitterness and unrequited desires that threaten to reignite the flames of conflict. And where is Alicia, the woman who caused all the chaos?


**Hello all. This story serves to bridge the gap between Pocket Rocket and the full-length sequel I aim to eventually write, and introduces the themes and storylines that fic will be based around. It is set on New Year's Eve of 2014, around ten months after the Pocket Rocket epilogues. Obviously this follows the timeline set out by PR so nothing that has happened in real life since I finished that story has occurred in this universe e.g. AJ dating Punk, Kaitlyn getting engaged and leaving WWE etc. Hope you enjoy! Favourites, follows and reviews will of course be much appreciated :)**

_11.50pm, December 31st 2014 - Lutz, Florida, USA_

"That's such a fucking cop-out resolution," Wade slurred with playful derision, taking another swig of his beer bottle.

"It's just the same as yours. You'll be drinking less, I'll be worrying less. It's the same principle," AJ argued back with equally playful indignation.

"But alcohol is a tangible, measurable substance, I can prove for a fact I'm drinking less. How the fuck are you going to measure worry?" he went on insistently.

"Well, every time I get that fretful feeling, you know the one, I'll make a note of it."

"But you didn't keep track of it last year, you'll never no for sure whether your worrying has decreased."

"Right. Sex is off," AJ snapped firmly and abruptly.

"What?" Wade queried with inebriated frustration.

"New year sex. Not happening," she elaborated, grinning at the adorable look of dejection beginning to form on his features.

"But you promised," he pouted. AJ let out a giggle. Though it tended to make him more foul-mouthed and dirty-minded than ever, alcohol also brought out an oddly child-like innocence in her husband.

"All promises are invalidated at the turn of the year..." she shrugged with cruel relish.

"...Anyway, you clearly don't want it that much. Usually when you've downed this much booze you're squeezing my ass and drowning my neck in beer-infused saliva."

"I'm trying to be more restrained and avoid making a scene like you said," Wade protested.

"You're in your own home, you can do whatever you want," AJ said.

"Yeah, but we've got company," he replied, gesturing vaguely toward their assembled colleagues who he had grudgingly allowed his wife to invite over to ring in 2015 with them.

"Did you see Drew and Summer earlier? We'd hardly be lowering the tone. This must be the first shindig in living memory where I've not had to throw some 'get a room'-esque comment Punk and Sasha's way as well."

"Very well then..." now it was Wade's turn to grin. He wasn't used to his displays of lust being encouraged rather than rebuked by the perennial object of his desire in such a situation; her innate prudishness in public saw to that.

But here she was cheekily egging him on, and having consumed the dazzling array of intoxicants that he had, and with that dress clinging to every toned inch of her tight little torso the way it did, he was in no condition not to take the bait.

He gently brought her in close to him with his hands around her back, lowering his lips to the nape of her neck as gently as his inebriation would allow and indulgently nipping away, revelling in the involuntary sigh she gave. His arms intuitively lowered along her spine to the pert, rounded swell of flesh that lay at its base and gave it a greedy, shameless grope.

"OK. We can still fuck," AJ murmured in his ear as she sought to level the scores on the groping front, her hands moving up his thighs and to his chiseled abdomen. Suddenly a mass-chanted countdown snapped them from their blinkered fixation upon one another and reminded them they were not alone.

"God I love that those are the last words you said to me in 2014..." Wade chuckled.

"...Happy new year, poppet. I love you."

"I love you too," AJ repeated and met him with a tender, tremulous kiss as the countdown reached zero.

As the room filled with the hearty cheers of their friends, Wade and AJ found themselves gazing upon one another, their eyes firmly interlocked. AJ wasn't much one for looking back, but the turning of a new year always brought out what little of a reflective side she had. If anyone had told her three years prior that the arrival of 2015 would see her happily married, to Wade Barrett of all people, with the remainder of her life carefully and satisfyingly mapped out, she would never even have begun to believe it.

Yet here they were, the chaotic rollercoaster ride that was their first year together had been more than worth it for the daydream of tranquil bliss that had followed it. She never thought it would appeal to her; a wedding, moving in together, building a home, planning a future. She'd always considered these things to be concrete milestones clung to by those fooling themselves into thinking they had found true love.

Now she realised what a wonderful expression of true love they all were. How being able to do these things without a second thought illustrated just how at one she was with Wade, how she didn't see her life with anyone else. No one would treat her with the unfaltering care and consideration that he did. No one would devote each day to making her feel as loved and appreciated as could be.

And no one else was as handsome. No one else could make her embarrassingly giddy with a mere look the way he was doing right now. Somehow after all this time she still managed to have the most monumental of crushes on the man. Her stomach still did somersaults every time she thought about the fact that she was the first and only woman to awaken this depth of feeling in him. This was definitely it for her.

That bright smile, that toothy, girlish beam she flashed at him so very often and was doing so once again at this moment; truly there was not a more beautiful sight in the world to Wade than this. His mood couldn't fail to lift whenever he saw it; a perfect embodiment of the light she'd brought to his life, the things she'd taught him about the brighter side to the world, the things that put her safety and happiness above all other priorities in his mind. He knew no other love than that he felt for his wife. She'd unlocked that corner of his mind where all before her had failed.

To think he'd nearly lost her that fateful night a year and a half ago, to think someone had deliberately, brutally harmed her, not caring whether she survived the ordeal or not; it still chilled him to the bone. His nightmares still primarily consisted of her being taken from him in all manner of horrific ways.

The world without her held no interest to him, yet he lived in constant, irrational fear of it. He daren't tell her, the last thing he wanted was his paranoia causing her distress as well as himself and he didn't want her to misinterpret as him pressuring her into hanging up her boots and joining him in relaxed, danger-free retirement. She'd told him she would stop when she was 30 and he was fine with that. But anything could befall her in those remaining three years, while she seemed to have fully recovered mentally from the whole Alicia horror story, her body still bore the scars. Her neck and back had never quite been the same following that brutal beating and her spells on the injured list were becoming more and more frequent.

Much as he was able to sympathise somewhat with Alicia's plight, he could not move past it in the way AJ herself apparently had. That woman's actions had curtailed AJ's dream career and left him unable to fully enjoy what should have been the unbridled glory of life with the girl he loved so much, and nearly denied him of that privilege completely. He could never forgive her for that. Wherever Alicia was now, he hoped for her sake she'd stay there.

* * *

_Meanwhile, upstairs at the same party..._

Sasha gave a deep sigh of relief and basked in the relative silence, the merriment downstairs fading to a distant burbling as she shut the door to the master bedroom. She felt so weak running away like this, and she was aware of how it exacerbated her feeling of childishness. But she had to get away. It was only when she observed her surroundings that she realised what a poor choice of refuge she had made.

Here she was sat on a marital bed, surrounded by photographs of the blissfully happy couple to whom it belonged and the idyllic life they'd built together. There were no pictures of her in Punk's house. There was no one bed that they could call theirs. No room furnished with the artefacts of their relationship. She was aware of how shallow it was to boil their love down to material items, but they served to symbolise the wider problem. In eighteen months things were no more or less serious than when they had begun. The possibility of a life like Wade and AJ's for her and Punk seemed further away than ever.

"There you are!" Sasha was jolted from her trance of lament by the snapping open of the door and the jarringly merry tones of the woman who she had somewhat unexpectedly come to regard as her best friend since she joined the main roster. Though Sasha and AJ had a large amount of shared interests and personality traits, when it came down to it she was able to forge a much deeper connection with Kaitlyn, one that transcended mere common ground. Kaitlyn was streetwise, rational and forthright, all qualities Sasha often found herself sadly lacking. She was the perfect confidante, not to mention having a wicked sense of fun that meant the good times were always plentiful. The big sister Sasha never had.

"Aren't you coming down? Would've thought you'd want your tongue down Phil's throat come midnight," Kaitlyn implored with a smirk, sitting down beside her on the bed. Little did she know she'd just uttered perhaps the worst words possible at this moment in time. Although Sasha's involuntary, stuttering sobs soon clued her in on that score.

As she hunched over, tucking her elbows in at her knees, Sasha felt Kaitlyn's sturdy arm extending around her back, as it always did the second a tear or a groan of despair left her. There was no one she would rather have here at a time like this.

"What's the matter, dear?" Kaitlyn questioned softly, in a tone that intimated, as if Sasha needed convincing, that she would be prepared to spend as long as it took for Sasha to impart her woes, and do everything she could to help and to understand.

"Look at this place!" Sasha exclaimed tearfully, gesturing hopelessly at the collage of photographs that festooned the wall.

"Eugh, revolting, aren't they?" Kaitlyn scoffed in a clear attempt to inject some levity into the situation.

"You know, April always said she wouldn't be 'one of those girls'; she'd never get married, she'd never build a cosy little love-nest... as if settling down with a guy and being a take-no-shit career-chick were mutually exclusive. And I always told her: 'wait until you meet the right man, then it'll all change,' and lo and behold..."

"I've always wanted this..." Sasha cut forlornly across her, voice laced with anguished and making it abundantly clear any attempt to lighten the mood would be doomed to failure.

"...always. My whole life. And now I have met the right guy and he just... eighteen months and no house, no proposal, no nothing. And it's literally impossible to have a serious conversation with him on the matter without seeming needy or manipulative. It's still this... _fling _to him."

"Fling? Mercedes, that man loves the bejeezus out of you, it's plain for anyone to see. I mean, let's be honest here, it's not as if Phil's averse to kicking a girl into touch when he's had enough..."

Kaitlyn paused, realising her choice of words had once again been rather unfortunate. A fresh wave of tears streaked down Sasha's cheeks and the Texan instinctively tightened her grip around the younger woman, pulling her closer in to her shoulder.

"That's the problem too. Maybe he does just see me as the latest in a long line. He's just not found the new and improved version yet. He's not settling down because throwing his lot in with me would be just that... _settling,_" Sasha managed to say before the cries overcame her and she buried her head. Kaitlyn's shoulders had absorbed enough of her tears in the last year to fill a small reservoir. She wished there was some tangible way of repaying her, but nothing scared or upset Kaitlyn the way so much still did Sasha herself.

"You need to talk with him, ASAP, before this drives you clean off the deep end..." Kaitlyn whispered in her ear, sounding stern but still fully sympathetic.

"Don't let him duck out, you deserve an answer. You've given him everything, the least he can give you in return is an honest verdict on where he sees things going long-term. But remember two things: One; whatever comes of this, there's nothing whatsoever wrong with you, you're that rare combination of sweet as honey, hot as lava and cool as fuck. And two; not that you should need telling this, but I'll be there for you, no matter what. You're never getting rid of me, girl, that I can guaran-damn-tee."

And just like that, Sasha was smiling. Just like that, confronting Punk was no longer the end of the world. It was still incredibly daunting and filled her with tremendous dread, but for the time being she could put it on the back burner and obtain something resembling enjoyment from the rest of the night.

"Please never get bored of cleaning up my messes, Celeste," Sasha breathed thankfully as she wrapped herself around her best friend's neck with such vigour she nearly tumbled back onto the mattress.

"Well you put up with my juvenile sense of humour, my mortifying drunken dancing, my merciless destruction of any privacy you may once have had, so I think it all evens out..." Kaitlyn shrugged with a grin.

"...Now get back down there to that young... _ish_, man of yours."

"OK. You coming too?" Sasha asked.

"I think I'll use the bathroom first. Altogether less suspicious if we don't come down together anyway," Kaitlyn replied with an oddly nervous laugh.

"Sure. You're fucking awesome by the way," Sasha smiled in parting as she descended the stairs.

"No more awesome than you... no less awesome either though, it's very much neck-and-neck," Kaitlyn shot back as she stepped into the bathroom and shut the door. However, once inside she had no intention of doing anything other than sitting on the floor and trying to process what on Earth was happening to her mind.

From their first lengthy conversation, she'd grown attached to Sasha Banks in a way quite different from any of her other close friends. She was naturally a very protective woman, but the petite Bostonian had awakened the most potent desire to play guardian she'd experienced yet.

She always thought no one would feel more like a little sister to her than AJ, and that had proven to be true, but for reasons quite astonishing and disorienting. At first it manifested itself as a hidden but fierce and burning disdain towards Punk; that he wasn't willing to provide Sasha with the reassurance she needed and most certainly deserved, that he seemingly didn't understand her well enough to know what he was putting her through. No matter how she tried to tell herself Sasha was an adult with her own life to lead, still it seared through her mind, infecting her every waking thought.

Now she knew why. She couldn't believe it, but there was no explanation. No other way of explaining the instinctual excitement and joy that Sasha's perfume lingering on her clothes was bringing out in her as it wafted up and teased her nostrils. No way of explaining how she'd not only never wanted to let go of her, but wanted to do more to put her at ease. It would have felt completely and utterly natural to have kissed those full pink lips, to caress that taut, athletic body and make it sing. She'd initially misinterpreted her fixation upon Sasha's physique as mere admiration, or even envy, but now there was no mistaking; that body turned her on something fierce.

She wanted to promise all the things Sasha so desperately craved, she wanted to leave the girl in no doubt that she was the most charming, alluring and adorable human being she had ever encountered. She wanted to give her everything. It all made sense now, how any male attention had become utterly unwanted in the last twelve months. Her heart had already made its choice. A choice she had never even considered making before. She'd never been attracted to a woman previously, maybe she never would again, but Sasha was all she could ever want.

But why on Earth would Sasha want her? She too had shown no signs of being anything other than solely attracted to men, and one man in particular. The man she had just been pouring her heart out over. The man Kaitlyn knew Sasha would rather destroy herself trying to get what she wanted from than attempt to switch her affections to someone willing to provide it without hesitation. You couldn't control who you fell for, which was exactly why Kaitlyn found herself here.

She would be the best girlfriend Sasha could possibly wish for. She would protect her, listen to her, understand her needs, share everything there was to share with her. But it was never, ever going to happen. She was always the one dispensing advice to her friends, who all seemed to have a propensity for finding themselves in the most improbably harrowing romantic binds. And now it had happened to her.

As the voices from downstairs, Sasha's no doubt among them, cheerfully hailed the arrival of 2015, Kaitlyn had never greeted a new year with less enthusiasm. She wanted the one she couldn't have and it was certain to drive her mad.

* * *

_4,564 miles away..._

Alicia didn't know why she chose Paris. She supposed it was far enough removed from the world she had left behind without being completely alien. She'd been pretty good at French in school and had picked it up again with surprising ease.

She'd not watched a single minute of wrestling since the day she got her marching orders from WWE, certain to never be welcome in the business again and lucky her actions didn't land her in a prison cell. She'd deleted any social media accounts she had, changed her phone number, her hair colour, her dress sense, her surname; anything anybody might associate with her life as a Diva had been well and truly erased from history. To anyone she met now, she was Victoria Sanderson from Riverside, California, and fashion photography was all she knew. Stepping in front of the camera was too great a risk if she sought to remain missing in action.

Only four people in America even knew she where she'd fled to; her parents, her sister and Gail Kim, whose timely, selfless intervention may well have been the only reason Alicia was still living and breathing. Gail had helped her get clean, referred her to some of her industry contacts in Europe and swore not to tell anyone else in the wrestling world of her whereabouts. All this had not stopped her being recognised on a handful of occasions of course, but she'd perfected the relevant French phrases to the point where she could convincingly pass herself of as just another_ Parisienne_.

After five years of the continual buzz, the drama and athleticism, the live crowds and the globetrotting that was WWE; the fashion world and the people that inhabited it seemed stiflingly dull, superficial and anodyne in comparison. Boyfriends had come and gone, a combination of a lack of common ground and the guardedness she now carried herself with for fear of her true identity being unearthed putting pay to anything long-term. But this was the way it had to be, the best case scenario. It was a choice between this and facing _them_, the people she'd  
wronged so gravely, who'd seen her very sanity buckle and bore the brunt of the breakdown.

She still asked about them, and was pleased to hear that as far as Gail was aware they'd all emerged unscathed from the thicket of violence and manipulation she'd dragged them through. But that made no difference. She couldn't face them, she couldn't confront any proof that it all wasn't just a horrendous year-long nightmare. How could she look in AJ's eyes again without being traumatised with flashbacks of her desperately begging for mercy as Alicia callously dismantled her in the ring? Into Sasha's without recalling how she mocked, demoralised and manipulated the poor young girl who had done nothing worse than be in the wrong place at the wrong time? Into Rosa's without remembering them widen in horror as Alicia sent her crashing through the porch fencing of her old house in Florida for daring to attempt to comfort her?

She couldn't. Victoria Crawford/Sanderson may have been alive and well, but Alicia Fox would rot in hell for eternity.


End file.
